Note E301 — 49.

"Cisley, in running after the Bishop in passing, as was the practice in former times, in order to obtain his blessing, might accidentally leave her milk on the fire; and on her return, finding it burnt to the pan, might probably curse the prelate for her mishap, which conduct deserved correction, or a left-handed blessing from her mistress." So Dr. Mavor. Mr. Skeat remarks in reference to it: "That stupid story makes me cross; it is such an evident invention, and no soul has ever adduced the faintest proof of any such practice. The allusion is far less circuitous, viz. to the bishops who burnt people for heresy. That they did so is too notorious." The following extract appears strongly to bear out Mr. Skeat's view: "When a thynge speadeth not well we borowe speach and say 'the byshope hath blessed it,' because that nothynge speadeth well that they medyll withall. If the podech be burned to, or the meate over rosted, we say 'the byshope has put his fote in the potte,' or 'the byshope hath played the coke,' because the byshopes burn who they lust, and whosoever displeaseth them."—Quotation from Tyndale's Obedyence of a Chrystene Man, 1528, p. 166, in Brockett, North Country Glossary, 1825, page 16. If we consider that these verses were written while the memory of the numbers who had suffered death at the stake for their religion was still fresh in the minds of the people, Mr. Skeat's view, borne out, as it is, by the foregoing extract, certainly appears the more reasonable and probable.